SECTION 1. The North Carolina General Assembly asserts that the Constitution of the United States of America does not prohibit states or their subsidiaries from making laws respecting an establishment of religion.

SECTION 2. The North Carolina General Assembly does not recognize federal court rulings which prohibit and otherwise regulate the State of North Carolina, its public schools, or any political subdivisions of the State from making laws respecting an establishment of religion.

In 1868, however the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified for the express purpose of changing this balance of power. While the early Constitution envisioned “rights” as little more than a battle between central and local government, the Fourteenth Amendment ushered in a more modern understanding. Under this amendment, “[n]o State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States,” nor may any state “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The Fourteenth Amendment completely transformed the nature of the American Republic, from one where liberties were generally protected — if at all — by tensions between competing governments to one which recognized that there are certain liberties that cannot be abridged by any government.

A bill filed by Republican lawmakers would allow North Carolina to declare an official religion, in violation of the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Bill of Rights, and seeks to nullify any federal ruling against Christian prayer by public bodies statewide.

The legislation grew out of a dispute between the American Civil Liberties Union and the Rowan County Board of Commissioners. In a federal lawsuit filed last month, the ACLU says the board has opened 97 percent of its meetings since 2007 with explicitly Christian prayers.

Overtly Christian prayers at government meetings are not rare in North Carolina. Since the Republican takeover in 2011, the state Senate chaplain has offered an explicitly Christian invocation virtually every day of session, despite the fact that some senators are not Christian.

In a 2011 ruling on a similar lawsuit against the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners, the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did not ban prayer at government meetings outright, but said prayers favoring one religion over another are unconstitutional.

“To plant sectarian prayers at the heart of local government is a prescription for religious discord,” the court said. “Where prayer in public fora is concerned, the deep beliefs of the speaker afford only more reason to respect the profound convictions of the listener. Free religious exercise posits broad religious tolerance.”

In an article published Wednesday on the conservative website RedState, Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus blasted Democrats for supporting Planned Parenthood, while floating the damning suggestion that the likes of President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) support infanticide.

“The President, the Senate Majority Leader, the House Democratic Leader, and the Chair of the Democratic National Committee (in whose home state this hearing occurred) made funding Planned Parenthood an issue in the 2012 campaign,” Priebus wrote. “They should now all be held to account for that outspoken support. If the media won’t, then voters must ask the pressing questions: Do these Democrats also believe a newborn has no rights? Do they also endorse infanticide?”

Priebus appeared to predicate much of his piece on recent testimony from a Planned Parenthood lobbyist before the Florida legislature. The lobbyist was posed a number of hypotheticals on what the women’s healthcare organization would do if a baby survived a botched abortion.

“Not once in her testimony did the Planned Parenthood representative say the newborn baby has a right to life. Not once did she say anyone has a duty to care for the child,” Priebus wrote. “Whether the living, breathing child survives is up to the adults in the room because, as we now know, Planned Parenthood doesn’t believe the baby has rights.”

Who better knows the outcome of this situation? The State? Priestb00 and his merry band of republican religious nuts?

Republican lawmakers in Tennessee are threatening to block Republican Gov. Bill Haslam’s school voucher bill over fears that Muslim schools could receive funding.

The Knoxville News Sentinelreported on Monday that Haslam hinted that he would withdraw his bill after objections from Republican lawmakers that it was not broad enough and that the vouchers could be used by Islamic schools.

Over the weekend, state Sen. Jim Tracy (R) had told The Murfreesboro Post that he had “considerable concern” that tax dollars could go to schools that teach principles from the Quran.

Tracy, who is on the Senate Education Committee and identifies himself as a member of the Church of Christ, insisted that Islamic school funding was an “an issue we must address” before the voucher bill can go forward.

“I don’t know whether we can simply amend the bill in such a way that will fix the issue at this point,” he said.

Yes, there is one Muslim school in Memphis that would have access to state funds under the bill. So, it’s wrong to fund Muslim schools, but you can guess which religious schools should be the only ones funded by government.

Look, I have nothing against other people’s free practice of religion. There are at least two great places for that to happen. The places are called THEIR home and THEIR place of worship. Every place else should be a religion-free zone. It’s obvious these folks didn’t get a very good education in American history or political thought. For that matter, the don’t appear to have been well-educated in much else. OR, they are just plain crazy. I’m going with the latter.

Luna I’m even later than you – I was here earlier but when I saw the “abortion” word I skipped over that part. This time I forced myself to read it. Honestly I don’t think any male should be commenting on abortion ever. It’s none of their business period. Worse for me, there is a global crisis on right now caused by men in banks and men in governments who refused to regulate their buddies mode of money making. People are losing all their savings, some people are living on pet food, people losing their homes, on the streets – that is a catastropy Yet these clowns are focusing on female body parts?

Update: I heard from the Florida Association of Planned Parenthood Affiliate, which said the following in a statement: “Last week, a panel of Florida state legislators demanded speculation about a vague set of extremely unlikely and highly unusual medical circumstances. Medical guidelines and ethics already compel physicians facing life-threatening circumstances to respond, and Planned Parenthood physicians provide high-quality medical care and adhere to the most rigorous professional standards, including providing emergency care. In the extremely unlikely event that the scenario presented by the panel of legislators should happen, of course Planned Parenthood would provide appropriate care to both the woman and the infant.”

Perhaps Priebus and RedState can run a correction?

Not likely, they can’t afford to lose support from the Xtian nutters. And I do mean nutters cause they are genuinely insane!

There’s only two ways to go with the name of Reince, you can either end up in the gutter or become the Chairman of the GOP, which is basically the same difference. First off, I want to know WTF kind of name is “Reince”? And were his parent’s as drunk as he always appears to be when they named him?

Yep….NC and TN are fucking religious zealot nuthouses. A couple of years ago the TN State Legislature repealed a law passed by the Nashville City Council that required businesses doing business with the Nashville city government to not discriminate against L/G’s in hiring. Hey, it’s ok to fire the gay in TN, it’s ok to refuse employment to the gay in TN because TN is a “right to work” state, unless you want to work while being gay. Nothing like freedom in Amerika. .

Actually from an objective point of view from the Great North, secession may just be the ticket, but forced session via removal of all federal grants, monies and assistance. If the state wants to go alone – let them. If they fail, which they will, refuse to bail them out. Federally remove all military bases, remove all access to military assistance, catastrophe assistance, any assistance. Design a plan to support those who are currently on medicare/Medicaid or other federal assistance plans by bypassing the state. Let them realize their dream – living on their own rules on their own dime without assistance from any other stat. Let them drown in their own rhetoric. I know that sounds really bad, but what did Bush do for Katrina so there’s already a GOP precedet.

BB sounds good to me. Mind you one of our western provinces is overrun with American oilmen millionaires wanting to be billionaires, meaning they are oil sands privateers. Can we trade – we return all of your privateers and all of the Catholic and Focus on Family people who are overrunning us, and we take all you guys? Our weather is rough in the winter but we do have the most wonderful restaurants and wine bars.

I visit B.C. frequently for culture, (Bruce Cockburn concerts), and for recreation, usually in summer. I was just up there weekend before last for FibresWest and a wonderful spinning class (too bad I couldn’t teleport JJ up there!).

Vancouver is such a cosmopolitan city. Could not afford to live there, though. Southwestern BC is much like western Washington state for climate and geography.

This is what happens when you give the lunatic fringe an inch. The media had no business ever presenting this claptrap as proof they were fair and balanced in their news coverage. Here’s the truth: on the one hand, we have a group of lefties who want justice and equality for all; on the other hand, we have a bunch of phony-Christian secessionists who sure in hell sound more like Pontius Pilate than the Jesus I learned about in Sunday School a millennium ago. Please, please, let these idiots secede. Please. I can’t take much more. They are defiant brats with the collective brain power of a slug.

SC & NC, like TN, GA, MS, AL, LA, AR, GA, KY, WVA, TX will never secede, they all receive far more from the Federal Government than they pay in taxes and all rank below #30 Michigan on the per-capita income scale . The secessionists just like to prance around on Confederate Battle fields in full Civil War regalia and pretend like the south still has a chance of rising again. I live just a couple of miles from a civil war battlefield, they will be play acting their glorious civil war victory within the next few weeks.

Sorry for going OT but this story on NPR’s All Things Considered caught my attention this afternoon. It’s about the insider trading indictments for the SAC Hedge Fund folks. The ATC link (only 4 minutes long) is here: http://www.npr.org/2013/04/03/176166670/legal-troubles-continue-to-mount-for-sac-hedge-fund-manager The founder of SAC, Stephen Cohen, hasn’t been indicted although his ex-wife is suing him for fraud. This guy paid $60 million for a home in the Hamptons & $155 million for a Picasso. Frankly, I can’t wrap my head around that. When I heard the $155 million all I could think about was how many people & animals that I could help if I had that kind of money. Guess I’m stupid and/or naive, but I don’t know how these kind of people sleep at night with the overwhelming need in this world. Hell, children going hungry in this country. Schools underfunded. The list goes on and on. Anyway, here’s a link to a piece on Cohen: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/hedge-fund-titan-buys-hamptons-property-for-60-million/

I’m reminded of back in the early Middle Ages IIRC, abortion for Xians was allowed for a longer amount of time if the fetus was female than if it was male. Beats me how they thought they could tell the sex in advance.

A bill filed in the state Senate Tuesday would carry a tax penalty for parents whose children register to vote at their college address.

Senate Bill 667, known as “Equalize Voter Rights,” would remove the tax exemption for dependents who register to vote at any address other than their parents’ home.

“If the voter is a dependent of the voter’s parent or legal guardian, is 18 years of age or older and the voter has registered at an address other than that of the parent or legal guardian, the parent or legal guardian will not be allowed to claim the voter as a dependent for state income tax purposes,” the bill says.

All that inside the beltway horseshit about the GOP learning from 2012 was just that, horseshit. They haven’t changed a damn bit, except get worse. Voter suppression and intimidation will be their real goals. Asshats!!!

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The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.

You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.